I find that one of the best parts of the game is that it makes you consider (and inevitably disagree with) something that has NEVER even crossed your mind before it calls you out on it. You CAN just turn away and go home. Alt+F4. If you/Walker decide to rationalise it as someone else's fault and press on more power to you and in that sense it is identical to every other war game instead of the one fundamental difference of it calling you out on it instead of fist bumping you afterwards

I find it fascinating that nobody questions this stuff in any game that doesn't try to ask them to sit down and think about what they've done.

Why do people praise this game by saying it makes you want to quit playing it? How is that a good thing?

Please just think about it for a moment. If that is the case then the developers have designed a game that sends the message that they do not want you to play this game. In that case perhaps they are doing something wrong and should find a different industry to work in.

The key difference between between Spec Ops and the Walking Dead, is that actual gameplay makes up a significantly larger portion of the former than the latter.

Yes, Spec Ops may be subversive (I personally thought it was pretentious as fuck), but it was so fucking boring. If 'de-constructing the genre' means making a tedious 5 hour slog through shooting gallery after shooting gallery, then please, give me more Call of Duty, because at least that game isn't so far up its own arse that it forgot to be game.

ShinyCharizard:You're reading too far into my statement. When I say I want more of a choice throughout the campaign I don't mean that I want every decision to be either heroic or evil. I would like to keep the theme of the despair and atrocities that war brings but allow more player input.

I wasn't saying that you were all in favour of binary black-and-white choices. I was saying that in this specific instance, with the white phosphorus, there is no feasible way to introduce an alternative that is worse than using the white phosphorus. Adding literally any other option to that scene would create a black-and-white moral dilemma, simply because the WP choice is so horrifically black that any other option looks white in comparison.

You'd have to either remove the white phosphorus, or add an alternative that is just as bad. If you did the former, you're cutting the most pivotal and creatively inspired scene in the game and creating a huge plot hole. If you did the latter, you're not really adding a "choice" because the player is still forced to do something terrible.

Also to suggest that players should consider turning the game off and stop playing is ludicrous and would mean a fundamental failure in game design on the developers part.

Why is it so ludicrous? The whole point of Spec Ops is that we shouldn't be playing these types of games. If you don't want to be a party to Walker's actions...don't play. That's their answer. Turn the game off. You can do it at any time.

Why is it so ludicrous? The whole point of Spec Ops is that we shouldn't be playing these types of games. If you don't want to be a party to Walker's actions...don't play. That's their answer. Turn the game off. You can do it at any time.

Can't you?

No because I am opposed to the idea that we should play games that make us want to turn off and walk away from out of shock/horror/disgust and so on. That goes against the very reason I play games and would be a terrible design to have in any game.

Video games should be about adventure, escapism, competition what have you. I don't want a game that tries to tell me this is bad and I shouldn't enjoy myself.

Does it get to be overrated because it's one of the all too few examples in gaming of something that actually has a higher point to prove and is trying to make a difference to the medium, and until we can start seeing stuff like this, and better, on a more regular basis then it needs to be played and promoted? Yes.

I do think some people don't think in the right mindset when it comes to this game. The main criticism it gets from people who don't like it is the gameplay is mediocre, which if it was left to stand on its own merits I would agree with. However when it is coupled with the story it changes because one of the stories messages is war isn't fun. The game needed sub par shooting in order to tell its message.

I think of it in the same way I think of survival horror games and their controls. Amnesia and Silent Hill are both games with clunky awkward controls but they add to the experience the designers were trying to create and both games would be worse off without them.

Why is it so ludicrous? The whole point of Spec Ops is that we shouldn't be playing these types of games. If you don't want to be a party to Walker's actions...don't play. That's their answer. Turn the game off. You can do it at any time.

Can't you?

No because I am opposed to the idea that we should play games that make us want to turn off and walk away from out of shock/horror/disgust and so on. That goes against the very reason I play games and would be a terrible design to have in any game.

Video games should be about adventure, escapism, competition what have you. I don't want a game that tries to tell me this is bad and I shouldn't enjoy myself.

Some people like rom-coms, some don't, some like horror, some don't. Some like drama's etc etc Looks like this type of story/game isn't your cup to tea.

And a twist ending that channels BioShock's "Would you kindly...", a twist that I didn't find really genius either, but at least it had some meta irony. The Line's ending didn't even make 100% sense to me and the general writing of the game was sub-par.

Also: lame, copycat writing in video games makes me assume ANY mission giving NPC is a twist waiting to happen - especially if they only communicate via radio.

(2) The characters are generic, but it didn't take too much away from the overall story for me. They could've used some more character development, particularly on Walker (flashbacks to their lives before Dubai perhaps?)

That would work against immersion though. You're Walker, so if other characters were saying things to you like 'remember that one time at x' you'd be like 'nope. I don't.' He works better as a blank slate.

I understand what they were going for with that scene among others. However personally I found it just didn't have any impact. Had the mortar been presented as an option that you could use to make the fight easier rather than being forced to use it would have made the events that occur after its use more personal and impactful.

That was the turning point for Walker so if you could get through that scene without using white phosphorous his subsequent guilt and hallucination would never happen and the game would be pointless.

On the issue of choice;

You are not playing as yourself you are playing as Walker. The white phosphorous aftermath is where you figure it out because you see Walker's reaction as you also react to the consequence. You don't choose Walker's reaction. This is where the disconnect happens when Walker goes more and more random. He deflects the blame and insists on moving forward while most players are thinking 'what?'. While his squad mate says 'He turned us into murderers!!!'. That's what the player is thinking of the game right now because we feel it wasn't our choice.

At the final scene the Konrad hallucination tells walker and us the player you could of just stopped. You wanted to be the hero so you continued. That goes for Walker and the player. The player didn't have to carry on playing the game at the white phosphorous choice, but we did because we wanted to be a god damn hero! Just like Walker.

Oh wait...but you can reject this completely by just shooting Konrad and reject all responsibility if you want to. That's the only real choice in the game. Do you accept responsibility for the 47 deaths? or do you blame the game/devs/ impossible situation.

To disconnect you from Walker and then to break the 4th wall anyway was pretty cool.

A game,story, film, song are made to evoke different emotions and responses, why can't it make you feel sick or shameful and sad!? Many stories are made about the downfall of a character where he has good intentions but completely messes everything up, I don't see the issue here. Apart from it being done more in the movies and being very rare for video games

tippy2k2:Well if you cut out the two pivotal scenes out of any great piece of work you could argue that it'd just be a generic "blank".

This game has been clipped by the same issue that clip a lot of great things: Everyone calls it the best thing ever and your expectations become so high that the game, no matter how great, can't possibly meet them.

I loved the story, the characters, and the voice actors (especially the VA's; Nolan North deserves whatever the gaming equivalent of an Oscar for his voicing talents). You didn't love it; does that make Spec-Ops a bad game?

The problem with the term over-rated is that it's 100% based on personal opinion. I thought that this was one of the best games of 2012 so no, I don't think it's over-rated. I also thought that Far Cry 3 (right up there in GoTY contention according to most gamers and game sites) was not a very good game so I think that's over-rated. Does that make Far Cry 3 a bad game?

Okay, yeah amongst the gaming community it does get quite a bit of press, however have you met someone who is not an avid gamer ( Joe Blow) who actually knows that it exists? Because I have not.... Anyone off the street if you were to say Call of Duty or Halo would know that you are talking about a video game, if you were to say "Spec Opps the line" or "Spec Opps" would they think you were talking about a video game, I doubt it, they would probably think of Seal Team 6 and the Osama raid.

A game,story, film, song are made to evoke different emotions and responses, why can't it make you feel sick or shameful and sad!? Many stories are made about the downfall of a character where he has good intentions but completely messes everything up, I don't see the issue here. Apart from it being done more in the movies and being very rare for video games

Again no Spec Ops goes beyond this. From what you guys are arguing about me with. The message of this game is that you should not enjoy this and you are wrong to enjoy the genre. Again a terrible message and one that should have no place in a video game.

A game,story, film, song are made to evoke different emotions and responses, why can't it make you feel sick or shameful and sad!? Many stories are made about the downfall of a character where he has good intentions but completely messes everything up, I don't see the issue here. Apart from it being done more in the movies and being very rare for video games

Again no Spec Ops goes beyond this. From what you guys are arguing about me with. The message of this game is that you should not enjoy this and you are wrong to enjoy the genre. Again a terrible message and one that should have no place in a video game.

That's fine. You're not going to like everything. But your insistence that because you don't agree with the message it shouldn't be in a video game is random. Even if it was critising the genre, it's allowed to say it.

The message I got from the game (in regards to other games) was when you try to play as hero it might not be that cut and dry. &also Possibly Pointing out how lame it is to keep playing as a hero to feel like a hero. would you continue if the character stopped being a hero?

If your annoyed that it's questioning your other FPS campaign missions then even if you didn't like it. It achieved it's purpose

A game,story, film, song are made to evoke different emotions and responses, why can't it make you feel sick or shameful and sad!? Many stories are made about the downfall of a character where he has good intentions but completely messes everything up, I don't see the issue here. Apart from it being done more in the movies and being very rare for video games

Again no Spec Ops goes beyond this. From what you guys are arguing about me with. The message of this game is that you should not enjoy this and you are wrong to enjoy the genre. Again a terrible message and one that should have no place in a video game.

A game,story, film, song are made to evoke different emotions and responses, why can't it make you feel sick or shameful and sad!? Many stories are made about the downfall of a character where he has good intentions but completely messes everything up, I don't see the issue here. Apart from it being done more in the movies and being very rare for video games

Again no Spec Ops goes beyond this. From what you guys are arguing about me with. The message of this game is that you should not enjoy this and you are wrong to enjoy the genre. Again a terrible message and one that should have no place in a video game.

Video games are a medium of storytelling an a way that movies and books can't convey due to interactivity as well as length.

but I'm fiding the gameplay very lacklustre which in turn is making rather apathetic about the story.

Don't go on forums then!It's a short game...restrain yourself!

yeah combat is mediocre, but as it's a short game the story should start to kick in. you might actually notice small things about how the combat atmosphere evolves that actually draws you further into the game. That's all I'm going to say

Yes. It is. It is a good game, but not THAT fucking good. Everyone on this side is rage masturbation over it story-line. Yes, the storyline is really damn good. WE get it. But here is the thing: I seen the story done before. It is called Apocalypse now. Sure, it is a movie and this is a game but whatever, I seen it before.

I find that one of the best parts of the game is that it makes you consider (and inevitably disagree with) something that has NEVER even crossed your mind before it calls you out on it. You CAN just turn away and go home. Alt+F4. If you/Walker decide to rationalise it as someone else's fault and press on more power to you and in that sense it is identical to every other war game instead of the one fundamental difference of it calling you out on it instead of fist bumping you afterwards

I find it fascinating that nobody questions this stuff in any game that doesn't try to ask them to sit down and think about what they've done.

Why do people praise this game by saying it makes you want to quit playing it? How is that a good thing?

Please just think about it for a moment. If that is the case then the developers have designed a game that sends the message that they do not want you to play this game. In that case perhaps they are doing something wrong and should find a different industry to work in.

You just need to take a step back and see it a bit more like art and bit less like a game. Spec Ops doesn't have fun gameplay as a prime goal, but critique on tropes and the FPS genre and players in general as it could only be delivered in an interactive medium and a self-aware audience. It's similar to a bit of the Stanley Parable (not gonna spoil it for you if you haven't played it, but if you have you should see the parallel).

Do traditional games mostly focus on having fun? Yes. Does this mean we should restrict the interactive medium to this goal? No. There's plenty of space for dramas, horror entries and fourth-wall-breaking critique in this medium.

I thought the narrative aspect was good, but the fact that fun gameplay was sacrificed to make it so was not a good decision my eyes. Also I a left wondering how much praise it would've garnered if it HADN'T come out when it did, amidst a torrent of modern military shooters.

I find that one of the best parts of the game is that it makes you consider (and inevitably disagree with) something that has NEVER even crossed your mind before it calls you out on it. You CAN just turn away and go home. Alt+F4. If you/Walker decide to rationalise it as someone else's fault and press on more power to you and in that sense it is identical to every other war game instead of the one fundamental difference of it calling you out on it instead of fist bumping you afterwards

I find it fascinating that nobody questions this stuff in any game that doesn't try to ask them to sit down and think about what they've done.

Why do people praise this game by saying it makes you want to quit playing it? How is that a good thing?

Please just think about it for a moment. If that is the case then the developers have designed a game that sends the message that they do not want you to play this game. In that case perhaps they are doing something wrong and should find a different industry to work in.

You just need to take a step back and see it a bit more like art and bit less like a game. Spec Ops doesn't have fun gameplay as a prime goal, but critique on tropes and the FPS genre and players in general as it could only be delivered in an interactive medium and a self-aware audience. It's similar to a bit of the Stanley Parable (not gonna spoil it for you if you haven't played it, but if you have you should see the parallel).

Do traditional games mostly focus on having fun? Yes. Does this mean we should restrict the interactive medium to this goal? No. There's plenty of space for dramas, horror entries and fourth-wall-breaking critique in this medium.

I can understand your point. But to have to pay money in order to play a game that tells you not too enjoy yourself and to stop playing is something that I cannot support.

I feel like it's been hindered by hype. I went into the game expecting an emotional rollercoaster which would leave me alternating between crippling guilt and existential terror as I contemplate the nature of my own hobby. Instead, I feel emotionally underwhelmed by a better-than-average story that told of, to me at least, not a man performing terrible acts in the school of war, but a man dragged along from one impossible situation to another.

In short: I never felt like I'd chosen to do something awful. I felt like I'd been steered to do something awful. And it's hard to hate myself when I know I'm supposed to do something awful, that there was no way to avoid doing something awful. I spent five minutes scoping around looking for an alternative to the white phospforous scene. I found none. There was exactly one road left open to me. It was that or turn off the game and go outs-

Again no Spec Ops goes beyond this. From what you guys are arguing about me with. The message of this game is that you should not enjoy this and you are wrong to enjoy the genre. Again a terrible message and one that should have no place in a video game.

No. Spec Ops' message is not 'you are awful for playing for shooters', it's 'just stop for a second and think what you're doing'. Like all the best deconstructions, Spec Ops simply asks that you reflect on whether you're okay or not with the points it raises.

If, at the end of Spec Ops, you decided 'fuck you Yager, I like games that don't judge me for gunning down hordes of brown people', that's fine. It's a perfectly valid answer to the question Spec Ops poses. And if you feel that Spec Ops didn't deliver that message, or ask that question, that's fine too. Feel free to not like it.

But you have to understand that some of us did get smacked in the face by that message. I felt awful after I completed it. And after reading the suggestion that I always had a choice, as did Walker - the choice to just stop, it really made me think. So even if I didn't think the voice acting, pacing and atmosphere was excellent, I would praise the game to the high heavens simply because it got me to think, and reassess some of my opinions on videogame violence.

As to the question of it being 'stupid' for a game to make you not want to play it, that it's obviously a failure on the part of the developers... well, I'd explore that through movies - the go to comparison for stories, I guess.

Let me ask you, have you seen Schindler's List, or Gran Torino? If you have, did you enjoy them? Because I sure as hell didn't. The latter in particular made me very uncomfortable at times, but I still hold them up as absolute brilliant movies because I was still thinking about them hours afterwards. Yes, this analogy is horribly flawed, because there are so many other things about those movies to appreciate. The quality of the acting, the cinematography, the tightness of a script that isn't strung out by hours of pure gameplay. But my argument is that these are both films that are not meant to be 'enjoyed' as a two hour diversion with a bag of popcorn - they're points for consideration.

I don't think that posing the question 'do you really want to keep playing this?' is a failure on the part of the developers, so long as you realise the question is being asked and think about your answer. I suppose the big difference between games and movies is that going to see a movie that raises uncomfortable questions isn't a £40 investment.

And if you don't think Spec Ops challenged your preconceptions, or did it in a forced manner, that's fine. Just understand that everyone that did is going to praise it, and be wary of calling it 'overrated' just because it provoked a deep impact for a lot of people, but not for you.

MacNille:Yes. It is. It is a good game, but not THAT fucking good. Everyone on this side is rage masturbation over it story-line. Yes, the storyline is really damn good. WE get it. But here is the thing: I seen the story done before. It is called Apocalypse now. Sure, it is a movie and this is a game but whatever, I seen it before.

Actually, it's a book and it's called Heart of Darkness. The main bad guy is even named after the author ;-p